Giffords Leaves Hospital for Rehab Center
The New York Times reports:
HOUSTON — Nearly two weeks after a gunshot passed through her brain, Representative Gabrielle Giffords left a Tucson hospital Friday and arrived at a rehabilitation center here to continue her recovery.
A medical helicopter carrying Ms. Giffords, her husband, her mother and doctor, arrived at the Texas Medical Center where she will be evaluated and then sent to the center’s Institute for Rehabilitation and Research at Memorial Hermann hospital.
When Ms. Giffords left Tucson Friday morning, hospital workers cheered as the motorcade of police cars, motorcycles and the ambulance carrying Ms. Giffords pulled away from University Medical Center, where she has been treated since the Jan. 8 shooting spree that killed 6 and injured 13. Reporters and camera crews gathered in large numbers and television stations’ helicopters flew overhead, and followed the ambulance from the hospital to an Air Force base, where traveled aboard a specially equipped plane to Houston’s William P. Hobby airport. Ms. Giffords has continued to make what doctors say is remarkable progress and is now able to distinguish colors and bear her weight on her feet. But doctors continued to caution that she faces months of intensive physical and speech therapy.
“I do want to caution everyone that she has a long road ahead of her,” Dr. G. Michael Lemole Jr., the chief neurosurgeon at University Medical Center, said Thursday. “It is not uncommon for someone to initially improve and then plateau for a little while and then improve again, so everyone has to gear their expectations for what she’s willing to show for us as opposed to what we want.”
